


Sail To The Moon

by theputterer



Series: assorted nonsense timestamps [2]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Cavalierly EU, F/M, Family, Family Dynamics, Future Fic, Gen, Nonsense Compliant, Parenthood, Pre-Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-13
Updated: 2017-08-13
Packaged: 2018-12-14 22:38:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11792937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theputterer/pseuds/theputterer
Summary: It's 28 ABY, and Leia Organa carries war, grief, and scandal to Jyn's front door.Jyn thought she'd already given everything she had to the cause.But that was before she had an eighteen-year-old son who is too much like her.[Or: Is there a limit to your forgiveness?]





	Sail To The Moon

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the Radiohead song, which Thom Yorke wrote for his son.
> 
> Includes references to SHARE WITH ME THE SUN and the Nonsense, though the story stands on its own. More or less.
> 
> And once more sorry for the longest Author's Note in the world at the end.

**_28 ABY_ **

It’s snowing when Leia Organa walks up to the house.

This isn’t unusual; rather, it’s entirely typical, snow falling on Fest. But the snow that falls around Leia Organa is bright, an almost gossamer white, the kind of snow that doesn’t regularly appear on the frozen planet. Festian snow is gray, and hard, and dark.

This snow is light, and fresh.

It’s a sign.

It’s change.

From the front window, Jyn watches Leia Organa march up the path to her house, and she thinks of the change that the snow, and Leia, and the New Republic, and the galaxy, is bringing to her doorstep.

She doesn’t realize how tense she is, how stiff her spine is, how her hands have clenched themselves into fists, until Cassian presses his hand to her back. He leans over her, his breath brushing her hair.

“Be kind,” he says, and Jyn closes her eyes.

_Do not scream at one of your oldest friends. Do not scream at one of your husband’s favorite people._

That’s who Leia is, to them.

She’s something else entirely to the galaxy.

_Do not yell at the recently disgraced politician. Do not yell at the daughter of a Sith lord._

But neither of these reasons are behind why Jyn wants to fling the front door open and demand that Leia leave her yard, and the city, and the planet, and never come back.

“She wants to talk,” Cassian says in her ear.

“Not only to us,” Jyn hisses back, and this statement touches on why Jyn wants to banish Leia from Fest forever.

Jyn’s pulse thuds in her head, her blood pumping through her veins, amping her up for a fight, the kind of fight she has not had in years. In over two decades.

She’s ready to draw blood, ready to _defend_.

Cassian squeezes her shoulder.

“Be kind,” he says again.

He steps past her, and opens the front door.

“Cassian,” Leia Organa breathes, and her hair is messier than Jyn has ever seen it, and her eyes are shiny and wet, and she’s shivering.

She throws her arms around Cassian in a tight hug.

“I’m so sorry, Leia,” Cassian murmurs.

“We always knew it would come to this,” Leia whispers, pressing her cheek into his sweater. “We knew. We _knew_.”

Jyn watches as a burst of wind sends white snowflakes spiraling through the open door, landing on the thick carpet, brushing up against the walls and corners of her home.

A particularly strong gust of wind rattles the pictures resting above the fireplace, and the movement catches Jyn’s attention, and she looks at the hologram of her parents, and the paper picture of Serafima Cassiano, and the newer holograms of her children, their big eyes, their cheerful, innocent smiles.

_Be kind_ , Cassian insisted.

Jyn cannot be kind.

(From the kitchen, she hears her twelve-year-old daughter giggle.)

(From the kitchen, she hears her eighteen-year-old son laugh.)

Jyn cannot be kind.

Not when Leia Organa brings such change to her home.

Not when Leia Organa has come for her son.

 

* * *

 

They were up all night watching the holonet when the news first broke.

_Rebel Alliance Leader Revealed To Be Daughter of Darth Vader_.

“Did you know?” Jyn whispered, not daring to look at Cassian, uncertain of what she’d find there.

Cassian had been close to Leia for three decades, for more than half her life. They’d been friends for years before Jyn had met Cassian, and then Cassian had worked for Leia, as a Senior Advisor to her, when she was Minister of Defense for the New Republic. Even now, they talked once or twice a month, checking in with the other.

Leia has always trusted Cassian more than she trusts almost anyone else.

But he’s honest with Jyn. He has always been honest with her.

“No,” he said, softly, and Jyn believed him.

It didn’t change Leia, in his eyes, or Jyn’s. She was still their friend, still someone they trusted wholeheartedly, still someone they loved.

Over the next few days, they learned that Leia was being ousted from the Senate, that she had fallen hard, fallen deep into disgrace. There were calls that she relinquish the Organa name, calls that she be forced to apologize for her biological father’s terrors, even calls that she be _tried_ for some of his crimes.

Luke Skywalker faced no such tirades, or insults.

He was too much of a legend, an icon, an obvious hero. A master jedi. A living myth. A savior.

Jyn got up one morning, and found her twelve-year-old daughter in the kitchen, listening to the news over the radio.

“Turn that off,” Jyn snapped, her calm morning mood evaporating swiftly, like sunlight on Fest.

Ersa hastened to obey, jerking upright and slamming her palm on the button of the radio.

Silence fell, the gray snow falling past the window making no sound.

“Leia is creating an army,” Ersa said.

“That’s nonsense,” Jyn said, and then, grudgingly, “Who said that?”

“The newscaster,” Ersa said, nodding back to the radio. “It’s rumors, but apparently Gial Ackbar has not been seen on Mon Calamari in weeks, and pilots and soldiers are suddenly defecting from the Academy on Chandrila. They say Leia Organa has put out a call to arms.”

Ersa’s words sent ice skittering down Jyn’s spine, especially because hearing her daughter, her little girl, throwing around the phrase _a call to arms_ was not something Jyn had ever wanted to experience.

“How do you know who Ackbar is?” Jyn asked.

“Papa’s mentioned him,” Ersa replied, and Jyn was visited by a desire to strangle Cassian. “He said he was a leader in the Rebel Alliance, but that he retired after the war, and lives on Mon Calamari. The newscaster said Ackbar rarely leaves the planet, which is why it’s so odd he’s disappeared so suddenly, and so soon after Leia got kicked out of the Senate.”

Jyn looked out the window, watching the dreary gray snow.

“Is it true, Mama?” Ersa asked, and Jyn closed her eyes.

They heard the front door open, the sound of someone kicking off their boots, hanging their coat in the front hall closet. Both Jyn and Ersa turned around in time to see Cassian walk into the kitchen, gray snowflakes drying in his hair.

He looked very sad, and very old.

“Leia’s on her way,” he said, and Jyn’s heart sank, while Ersa’s eyes widened.

“Did you talk to her, Papa?”

“She called me,” Cassian confirmed, looking at Ersa. Like with Jyn, Cassian was always honest with Ersa; sometimes, Jyn worried he was _too_ honest with her. He tended to tell Ersa everything she wanted to know about the Civil War, answering her questions with an unflinching honesty that Jyn was convinced would only lead to anxieties and nightmares for Ersa.

But Ersa seemed to take it all in, the horrors and the losses, with grace. With thoughtfulness.

She was very much Cassian’s daughter.

“Fima called me, too,” Cassian added, and Jyn’s eyes flew to him.

His eyes were wide, and dark, and the eyes their children inherited. He was looking straight at her, as was Ersa.

“He told me…” And Cassian swallowed, and Jyn knew what he was going to say before he said it.

While Ersa was Cassian’s daughter, Fima was Jyn’s son.

“He’s coming home, Jyn.”

There was only one reason for Fima to come home, now, in the middle of the semester, at the exact same time Leia Organa was making an unusual visit to Fest.

Fima was coming home to say goodbye.

 

* * *

 

 

All three of them went to the Port of Fulcra to greet Fima.

They hadn’t seen him in two months, not since he’d flown to Coruscant for the beginning of the new semester at the University, but Jyn thought he looked the same.

Fima was eighteen years old, and was the same exact height as Cassian, and skinny like him too. He had Cassian’s eyes, the Sernpidal eyes, and similar brown skin, but this was where their resemblances ended.

He had Jyn’s mouth, and her chin. He had her hair, in shade and thickness, and at the moment, in length, with Fima’s brushing his shoulders. He had her laugh, and the same jaw muscle that twitched when he was angry.

(His first word was _Mama_.)

He had her smile.

(His first steps were towards her, waiting across the room.)

He had her energy, and her spirit.

(He wanted to name his sister after her because there was no one in the universe he loved more than his mother.)

In short: He had _her_.

Fima had always felt more like hers, like Ersa had always felt more like Cassian’s. Fima had staked a claim on Jyn from the moment she knew he was going to exist. It was a claim that ensnared her, that grasped all the little, frayed, lost threads of her life at the time (a Cassian thread, an Onderon thread, a Fest thread, a war orphans thread, a Shara Bey thread) and held them for her, giving her something solid to cling to when she felt so adrift in the universe.

Jyn had never felt more devoted to anything like she had to Fima, and it was a desperate, lifelong devotion that she wasn’t about to lose anytime soon.

It was a devotion that made her heart feel heavy when Fima spotted them, and grinned.

Ersa wasted no time in ducking away from Cassian, to sprint the twenty yards that separated them, to leap into her brother’s arms. Fima caught her, and Jyn could hear his laugh over the sounds of the landing ships and the chattering passengers, and her chest _ached_.

Cassian took her hand.

He led her to their children, and Fima smiled at her, and said, “Hi, Mama.”

He pulled her into a hug, and she clung to him, and she opened her mouth to speak, to beg, _Please, no, please don’t do this_.

Instead, she said, “Hi, baby.”

Fima hugged Cassian next, and Jyn clenched her hands into fists, and she could feel Ersa’s eyes on her, but she couldn’t look at her, certain she would fall apart if she did, certain she’d start screaming and cursing at Fima there, in the crowded transport station.

Cassian and Fima broke apart, and Cassian gripped his son’s shoulders, and nodded once, and Fima nodded back.

There was an understanding there.

And a forgiveness.

Even though Cassian had never been much of a forgiving person, even though it was something he’d struggled with all his life, he found it in him to understand his son, and forgive him for what he was going to do next.

Jyn had always been the more forgiving one.

But this, _this_.

Fima had come home to say goodbye.

Fima was going to war.

It was the realization of her absolute worst fear, the culmination of a lifetime of terrors, of suffering, of pain, and loss.

How could she forgive him for this?

 

* * *

 

It was quiet on the way home.

Ersa chattered away, to try to break up the silence. She told Fima about what she’d been learning in school, of how her best friend Nyota was doing on Mantooine, of the afternoon she’d spent ice boarding last week.

Fima listened, and nodded in the right parts, and teased Ersa, and asked a question or two, and it was so normal, so commonplace, when in reality everything was falling apart.

Jyn listened, and she couldn’t speak.

Cassian glanced at her, but didn’t say anything.

He didn’t try and touch her, and she was grateful for that.

 

* * *

 

Jyn waited until they’d all made it into the house, waited until Fima had dropped his bags off in his room (more bags than he would bring for a short stay at home, because he’d brought all his bags, _everything_ , had emptied his dorm room at the University because he was not going back), waited until Ersa went into her room for a scheduled hologram call with Nyota, waited until Cassian had gotten the fire in the front room going, and then she broke.

“You are not enlisting with Leia Organa, Fima.”

She was proud of how even her voice was, how it barely shook, how she could look Fima in the eye and not cry, but stand straight-backed, and tall, even though she was over a head shorter than him.

Fima swallowed, and half-glanced at Cassian, and she expected that Cassian had warned him she would react like this, and she knew she should be upset about that but she had no space in her mind to think about Cassian.

“It’s the right thing to do, Mama,” Fima said, softly.

“No, it is not,” Jyn said, and her voice was firm. “It’s going to war, Fima, and that is not right. That is not something you do.”

Because Fima was an art and history student at the University of Coruscant.

Because Fima was eighteen years old, and had never seen a battlefield.

Because Jyn and Cassian had already fought in a war, so no child would have to.

Because Fima was _better_ than both of them.

“Mama,” Fima said.

Cassian was sitting on the couch, watching Jyn and Fima standing in front of him, but he made no move to stand, or intervene.

“You’ll stay with us for a few days, and then you’re going back to school,” Jyn said, firmly. “That’s where you belong. At school, on Coruscant. Not… Not in a war zone, somewhere in the Outer Rim.”

“I’m eighteen--”

“Yeah, and I’m fifty,” Jyn snapped. “Don’t try to pull that on me.”

“I’m an adult--”

“And I’m your mother,” Jyn said, practically snarled it. “You do as I say. You _listen_ to me.”

Fima looked away from her, turning to Cassian, a pleading look in his eyes. 

“Jyn,” Cassian said, quietly, and Jyn turned on him.

“Don’t you dare, Cassian,” she hissed.

“It’s his choice,” Cassian said, looking up at her, and he spoke slowly, in short, clipped sentences, and she knew he was picking his words with care. “You know that. He’s right. He’s an adult. It’s his life, and he gets to make his own choices now.”

“And you would know all about _choosing_ to go to war, wouldn’t you?”

Cassian winced at her words, but didn’t dispute them. Jyn didn’t regret them.

Fima spoke up.

“I do feel like I have to do this,” he said, and Jyn spun, ready to declare that the point she’d been trying to make, when Fima added, “But because it’s the _right thing to do_. The First Order, it’s… I’ve read about it, and it sounds just like the Empire. It’s… It’s horrible, and awful, and it must be stopped. And I can help accomplish that.”

“But it doesn’t have to be _you_ ,” Jyn said.

“It didn’t have to be you, either,” Fima pointed out. “But it was.”

“The New Republic will--”

“It won’t,” Fima interrupted. “You only have to read the news, listen to the holonet. The New Republic Military won’t do anything. It won’t move fast enough. Leia Organa knows that, that’s why she’s founded the Resistance.”

Jyn snorted. “Is that what she’s calling it?”

“It’s too small to be any recognizable _Alliance_ , but maybe, with Ackbar, and Papa--”

“ _What?!”_

Jyn jerked her head around so quickly her neck ached.

Cassian met her gaze.

She hadn’t once considered that Fima would not be going to war alone.

She hadn’t even imagined that Cassian would go back to war.

She hadn’t believed her faith in Cassian, and his promise, could be worthless, after all this time.

“No,” Cassian said, accurately reading the betrayal and shock in Jyn’s expression. “No, I’m not going back.”

“Then what is he talking about?”

“Why Leia is coming here, to see us,” Cassian said. “She needs help. _Financial_ help.”

Jyn had assumed Leia was coming to Fest to talk to Cassian about strategy, about how to get a Rebellion started, because Cassian had been there for the early days of the Fest Rebellion, the Coruscant Rebellion, and the Alliance.

Now, she understood there was another reason.

Cassian’s substantial inheritance from his Sernpidalian mother.

“Were you going to talk to me about this?” Jyn demanded.

“Of course,” Cassian said. “But Jyn, she’s going to use the money to help save the galaxy. I can think of lesser causes.”

“Yes,” Jyn snarled. “Like using your money to get your son killed.”

A short silence followed this statement.

Jyn felt a sting of remorse for the words, but couldn’t find a lie in them.

Cassian’s lips twisted, and Jyn knew he was upset with her words.

“They need help,” Cassian said, voice somehow still soft.

“You’ll give her your money _and_ your son, where do you draw the kriffing line, Cassian--”

“It’ll protect him,” Cassian said, raising his voice. “Jyn, Fima is going regardless of what you say. Of what I say. He’s _going_. And if we can help Leia buy medicine, and ships, and food, and--”

“Blasters,” Jyn said. “Bombs. Vibroblades. _Weapons_ , Cassian.”

“Yes,” Cassian said, nodding. “All of those things. Because you can bet the other side has them, too. Of course they do.”

“All the more reason why Fima isn’t going--”

“Mama,” Fima said, and both his parents looked at him.

Fima’s chin was lifted, eyes sharp, unwavering, and Jyn couldn’t help but think that he looked a lot like her, when she was eighteen, doing everything she could to survive, defying anything and everyone.

“Mama,” Fima said. “I’m going.”

 

* * *

 

And now Leia Organa is sitting at Jyn’s kitchen table, still wearing her heavy coat, a cup of hot Festian spice tea in her hands.

“Thank you,” she says, when Cassian sets down a plate of homemade flatbread in front of her. “I’m somehow always surprised at how cold Fest is, no matter how many times I make the trek out here.” She peers at Jyn. “You’ve acclimated quite well, haven’t you, Jyn?”

“I’ve lived here for nineteen years,” Jyn says, deadpan.

“That’s right,” Leia says, her cheeks flushing with the reminder, with the unspoken truth that Fima was a big reason as to why Jyn chose to stay on Fest.

Cassian sits down in the chair between the two women, glancing at each of them before settling on Leia.

“What do you need, Leia?” he asks.

_Our son_ , Jyn thinks.

“Advice,” Leia says. “Now that Travia Chan’s passed on, you’re the only connection I have left to the Fest Rebellion. Anything you can tell me about the early days, how it got started, I’d like to hear.”

Cassian nods. “All right.”

“And…” Here Leia hesitates, lips thinning.

Cassian smirks.

“Leia Organa, uncertain how to talk about credits,” he murmurs. “Now I’ve seen it all.”

“It’s a delicate subject,” Leia says, eyes flashing.

“We’ll give you the money,” Jyn says, unexpectedly, and Cassian and Leia turn to look at her.

Leia looks surprised, while Cassian frowns, and Jyn expects he knows what she’s going to say.

“We’ll give you the money,” Jyn says, “If you refuse to enlist Fima.”

“Jyn,” Cassian starts, but he’s interrupted by Leia.

“I wasn’t aware Fima was interested in enlisting.”

“He says he is,” Jyn says. “He thinks he’s ready, thinks he can handle war. But he can’t, and you must refuse him. Make him go back to the University.”

Cassian sighs. “Jyn, there is no reason for Fima to be denied--”

“There is if Leia wants funding from us,” Jyn snaps, interrupting Cassian, keeping her eyes locked on Leia. “It’s one soldier, versus the credits you desperately need for your military. You’re a strategist, Leia, you know the right answer here.”

“I know the correct answer,” Leia replies. “I’m not sure it’s _right_.”

“Oh, that’s _rich_ , talking to me about correct versus right--”

“Fima is… eighteen, if I recall correctly?” Leia asks. When Jyn makes no move to answer, Leia turns to Cassian, who nods. “He’s of age in every system in the galaxy. He’s healthy, he’s smart, he’s of sound mind… There is no good reason to refuse to enlist him in the Resistance, not if he wants to.”

“There is _every_ reason,” Jyn snaps.

Leia looks at her, and her big brown eyes are warm, and sympathetic, but they send a wall of ice down Jyn’s spine.

She is suddenly scared of what Leia is going to say next.

“He’s your son,” Leia says, voice soft, and Jyn doesn’t think Leia has ever spoken like this to her before. “You’re scared for him. You know what war is like, you remember it well. And he’s your _child_. I understand, Jyn. I’m a mother, too, with a son poised to fight in this war.”

Jyn’s fury begins to calm with the absolute truth of Leia’s words.

She always favored Leia, as a leader, for her honesty.

Somewhere in the galaxy is Ben Solo, twenty-three years old, a jedi, trained under Luke Skywalker himself. Ben Solo, the only child of Rebel Alliance legends Leia Organa and Han Solo.

The target on his back could cover most planets.

The risks for Ben Solo are probably greater than the risks facing Fima Andor.

But Fima is _hers_.

“He’s my baby,” Jyn says, and her voice is a croak.

She’s lost her anger; it’s been replaced by the emotions she’s spent the past few days trying to hold back, to prevent herself from experiencing, the emotions she got a glimpse of when she saw her eighteen-year-old son smile at her in the transport station in Fulcra.

She’s filled at once by a crushing despair.

By pure and simple _hopelessness_.

She’s facing the Death Star again, but this time, it’s turned to her son, and she can’t throw herself in front of him. She can’t save him.

“I know,” Leia says, still so gentle, so sure, like she can see straight through Jyn, and Jyn wouldn’t put it past her. “I understand. Believe me, I do. You think he’s always going to be your baby, and in a way he is, but… He’s also grown now, Jyn. He’s an adult. This is his choice.”

As she speaks, she reaches forward, and covers Jyn’s hand with hers.

Cassian watches this movement but remains completely still, and Jyn wonders what’s stopping him from breaking like she has.

“Your son, Jyn,” Leia says. And then, with further emphasis: “ _Your_ son.”

And Leia’s right, of course.

Leia Organa was the first person who looked at Fima, then barely six months old, and announced that he was going to take after Jyn. Before that, everyone had looked at Fima’s dark eyes and dark hair and had only seen Cassian, a fair observation.

But then Fima had gotten older, had developed a personality and clearer facial features, and Leia was proven right, as she nearly always is.

Fima Andor is Jyn Erso’s son.

Of course Jyn Erso’s son is going to war.

 

* * *

 

The biggest fight Jyn and Fima ever had resulted in Fima running away from home, directly into a snowstorm.

Fima was sixteen years old, of legal age on Fest, and was set to graduate school. He spent months poring over career guides, and took aptitude tests and surveys, and asked his parents for advice on what he should do next.

Cassian’s recommendation was to work in the government, to give back to Fest in some way. It was what Cassian did, as the Ambassador to Mantooine for Fest, a position he should’ve vacated when Travia left the Office of Prime Minister, had he not been asked to stay on by the new, then-incoming Prime Minister.

Jyn suggested Fima come work with her in the orphanage she ran in Fulcra. He’d practically grown up in the orphanage, his earliest friends being the children that lived in the building, playing with them in the halls, going to school alongside them. He’d frequently returned to the orphanage, to hang out, and to mentor the younger children as he got older.

But Fima wasn’t sure he wanted to work for the government, or in the orphanage.

He was sixteen, and sixteen-year-olds tend to prefer to distance themselves from their parents.

They tend to _rebel_.

One morning, Fima announced he wanted to go to university, to study art and history.

Both Jyn and Cassian were surprised by this decision.

“He’d be the first in my family to go to university, as far as I’m aware,” Cassian commented, as he and Jyn watched from the kitchen as Fima and Ersa, Ersa holding her older brother’s hand, walked down the street to the transport that would take them to school. “But your father must’ve gone to university.”

Jyn shrugged. She did think her father had gotten some form of higher education, but she didn’t know if it was at a university, or through a science program run by the Old Republic.

“I’m proud of him,” Cassian said softly, watching Fima lead ten-year-old Ersa through the snow. “He should go.”

There was a university on Fest, in Edur, a city on the other side of the planet. It was fairly small, much smaller than the universities around the Core Worlds, but it was the only university in the Atrivis Sector, and had a good reputation among the other planets of the Outer Rim.

Jyn assumed Fima would want to go there.

She spent the day at work trying to talk herself into being okay with her son moving to the other side of the planet, only to come home to Fima’s announcement at dinner that his first choice in university was the University of Coruscant, followed by Sperinad University, and then the University of Garos.

Garos was on the other side of the Hydian Way.

Sperinad University was on Esseles, in the Core Worlds.

Right next to Coruscant, a planet Jyn wholeheartedly despised.

Before she knew what she was saying, she was telling Fima absolutely not, that he couldn’t go.

What followed was a screaming match for the ages.

Jyn and Fima had always been too alike, had tempers that flared and raged in the same ways, and so it followed that their arguments were always a little circular, and always a little violent. They knew how the other would think and react, and they knew how to cut, how to offend, and how to hurt.

Cassian and Ersa fled the kitchen in about a minute, and hid in Ersa’s room, to wait it out. It was the only thing they could do; neither of them were ever able to halt a fight between Jyn and Fima once it got going.

Jyn couldn’t remember most of the fight, the specifics of it, the points she’d been trying to make. But she did remember how Fima’s face reddened with emotion, like hers did, and she remembered how his eyes were shiny, how he was close to crying with frustration, how he kept arguing anyway.

And she definitely remembered, with clarity, saying that if Fima left for any of those schools, he would not be welcomed back into her house.

She didn’t mean it.

Of course she didn’t mean it.

And on some level, Fima knew it, too.

But he was sixteen, so young and so determined to prove himself, so determined to be independent.

So determined to be away from his mother.

So determined to be anyone but her.

“I hate you,” Fima said. 

He walked out of the kitchen, grabbed his coat from the closet, and disappeared into the snowstorm outside.

In the sudden silence, Jyn took a minute to breathe, and then she replayed what she’d said.

And then she was off, running through the kitchen, throwing the door open, and dashing outside without her own heavy coat.

She yelled Fima’s name, but she couldn’t see or hear him through the storm.

She made it half a block before Cassian caught up to her, seizing her elbow and forcing her to still long enough for him to pull her arms through the sleeves of her coat, her shivering so pronounced.

“He’ll be okay,” Cassian said, sounding more confident than Jyn thought he should. “He’s just upset. He’s probably gone to a friend’s house for a bit.”

But Jyn thought of the things she’d said, in the heat of the argument, in her fear.

Because it had been fear. Fear of Fima leaving home, fear of Fima moving far away, fear of Fima on Coruscant, a planet that Jyn held very few good memories of, had very little appreciation for, a planet that had once housed so many Imperials, and was rumored to still be a safe world for the ones who’d escaped the New Republic’s eye.

But mostly: it was the fear of Fima leaving _her_.

“I can’t f-find him,” she whispered, stuttering with the cold.

She remembered a recurring dream she’d had when she was pregnant with Fima, where she’d watch the ghost of Serafima Andor spin colors out of gray clay, interrupted only by the sound of a child’s laugh, a child Jyn could never see or find.

She remembered being pregnant with Fima, and feeling so alone, and how she’d promised her unborn son that she would never leave him, like so many had abandoned her, like Cassian had left her. That she’d stay with him, and protect him, and always love him. That she’d fight _for_ him.

“I have to find him,” she said, insistently, and tried to shove Cassian away.

But Cassian held firm, shaking his head.

“You’ll never find him in this storm, Jyn,” he said, his voice barely audible over the howling wind. “We should go home, and call his friends, and find out where he’s gone that way.”

“But what if he’s _lost?_ ” Jyn pressed. “What if he doesn’t know where he is, what if he’s wandering alone, in the cold, what if he falls and gets hurt?”

Cassian frowned, looking away from her and into the chaotic storm, the snow whipping past their heads, hitting their chests with bits of ice.

“I can’t leave him,” Jyn said.

“You’re right,” Cassian said. “Just… Wait here. Let me run home and tell Ersa to start calling his friends, and see if she can find him that way. And I’ll grab a comlink so she can call us if she finds him. Wait for me, okay?”

Jyn nodded, and watched as Cassian turned, vanishing into the storm.

She thought of her recurring dream, and how she was always forced to watch Cassian disappear into the snow of Fest, ignoring her calls for him.

She stood alone in the snow, and thought of Fima, similarly alone.

Without waiting for her husband, she walked further into the storm.

She yelled Fima’s name, forcing her voice to be audible over the roaring wind, doing her best not to choke on the bits of ice and frost that pelted her face. She pushed herself, getting her legs to step through the thick gray snow that rose to her thighs, even as her whole body trembled with the freezing temperature.

She didn’t know how long she was out there before she heard his voice.

“Mama?”

“Fima?” She yelled, and lifted her hands to her eyes, trying to peer through the thick gray snow.

There was someone walking towards her.

She’d recognize him anywhere, in any storm, on any planet, in any universe.

She ran, and swept Fima up in her arms.

He was shaking, and his cheek felt like ice next to hers, but he was with her, he was okay.

“I’m sorry,” Fima said, and he sounded like he was six years old, and he was sobbing, and she thought her heart was actually going to break, that he felt he had to apologize to her, after the terrible thing she’d said. “I don’t hate you, Mama, I don’t, I don’t--”

“I know, baby,” Jyn said, and she was crying too. “It’s okay, it’s okay, I know. I love you, I love you. I’m so sorry.”

Eventually, she pulled back, and wrapped her arm around his waist, and began pulling him back to the house with her.

Ersa cried a little when she saw them, blubbering that Cassian had called her and said he couldn’t find Jyn either, and she’d been so worried, convinced her mother and her brother and her father were all going to die out in the snow and leave her alone.

She called Cassian, who walked into the kitchen ten minutes later, to see Jyn and Fima at the table, with thick blankets wrapped around them, drinking hot chocolate.

He closed his eyes at the sight, opening them to glare harshly at the two of them. “Never do that again.”

Fima nodded, while Jyn reached out and took Cassian’s hand.

The three of them sat, and talked with Fima about why he wanted to go to university so far away. He told them about the programs he liked, how he wished to study the history of the Old Republic and the civilizations before it, and how he was interested in studying art, particularly pottery-making, because he felt firmly that one of them should, and Ersa would obviously be far too bored with pottery-making to be any good at it.

The interest in pottery-making, Jyn knew, came from Cassian’s mother’s side of the family. Since the deaths of Akim and Yakovi Cassiano, Cassian Andor, and Fima and Ersa, were the last of the famous Cassiano potters. But Cassian had never expressed an interest in pottery-making, despite Serafima’s best efforts, and it was a disinterest Ersa shared.

Jyn wasn’t too surprised by Fima’s own interest in the art now.

He might’ve inherited Serafima’s name, but it wasn’t just that.

It was that Serafima and Jyn were a lot alike, but only Serafima Cassiano had had the time to explore who she would’ve been if her family had not died and abandoned her, while Jyn Erso had never had any such time.

Maybe in some other universe, Jyn Erso was an artist.

It stood to reason that in this one, Fima would be.

So she listened as Fima explained how he favored the education at Coruscant over all the others, and he’d clearly done his research, had gone through his options, and Jyn could think of no reason to oppose Fima’s decision save for her selfish wish to have him close to her always.

In the end, Fima was accepted to the University of Coruscant.

They flew with him to Coruscant, helping him get set up at school, and Jyn took her time studying the planet, the city, and had to agree with Fima that Coruscant had cleaned up a bit, had become safer, since its time under Imperial control.

She watched as Fima pointed out the science buildings of the campus to Ersa, who was displaying a sudden and almost alarming interest in the laboratories around the campus, and Jyn wondered if Ersa was going to study the field that the grandparent she shared her name with did, like Fima was with art. She wondered if this said more about Galen Erso’s legacy, or who Cassian Andor had become in another universe. She didn’t think it really mattered.

“Well, now we can relate to Fima on going to school on Coruscant,” she commented to Cassian.

“I think Fima is going to have a much different experience than both of ours,” Cassian said. “Much better.”

And she couldn’t disagree with that, either.

She imagined he would have a happier experience than Cassian’s brutal time at the Royal Imperial Academy.

And she knew he would have a happier experience than she did at school on Coruscant, when the man in white regularly appeared on her family’s doorstep.

“He’s safe,” she said, mostly to herself, watching her son’s brilliant smile. “He’s quick, he’s clever… He’s going to be okay.”

“Of course he is,” Cassian said, frowning at her, like Jyn’s words were so obvious they were bordering on nonsensical. “Of course he’s all of that. Of course he’ll be okay here. He’s just like you.”

 

* * *

 

Leia is staying at a hotel in Fulcra, rather than their house, and Jyn is sure she’d made the decision to give them privacy, to say goodbye to Fima as a family, without her there.

Leia is set to leave in two days’ time, and Fima is going with her.

Jyn lies in her bed, and stares at the ceiling, and tries to think it through.

Tries to accept that Fima is going to war.

She doesn’t know how to, or what to make of it.

It’s the middle of the night, and she knows she should sleep. She’s taken the next couple of days off work, and Cassian has too, but they’re taking the time off so they can spend every hour they can with Fima, and Ersa, the four of them together as a family. Jyn knows she should sleep, but she can’t.

Cassian is not asleep either, but this is not unusual for him. He’s never slept particularly well, and he frequently struggles with bouts of insomnia, the trauma of the war preventing him from getting rest.

But he isn’t in the bed with her, and she thinks she wants to talk to him.

She gets up, and steals a sweater from his side of the closet, and walks out of their room.

She wanders down the hall, spying a light from the kitchen on, and she guesses that Cassian has settled in there with a cup of tea, sitting in the quiet, watching the snow fall outside.

This is why she’s startled by the sound of Cassian’s voice.

“... What I would’ve wanted to know, if I knew what to ask,” Cassian says. He’s speaking softly, and she frowns, freezing at the voice that responds.

It’s Fima’s.

“You’re giving this to me?”

Jyn shuffles forward, and peers around the corner, and sees Cassian sitting at the table, Fima across from him. The table is cleared, save for two mugs, and a small, leather-bound notebook. Cassian is pushing it towards Fima.

“I can’t…” Cassian sighs. “I don’t know how to prepare you, for what you’re about to face. What you’re going to be asked to do. I’ve written down every piece of advice I can think of, things I think will help you get through it all. Everything my trauma counselor has taught me, the mantras my mentors gave me to remember. The things your mother has told me that have saved my life, the kind words you and your sister have said to me that makes me believe it was worth it all. You’re…”

And here Cassian breaks off, and presses a hand to his face, and Jyn sees Fima’s eyes widen, and she wonders if Fima has ever seen Cassian cry before.

“There are things you must remember,” Cassian whispers, choking a little on his tears.

Fima nods, leaning forward.

“You must remember why you’re there,” Cassian says. “Why you’re fighting. It must _always_ be a conscious choice, Fima. It must be _your_ choice. Not because it’s simply the right thing to do, but because it’s the thing you _want_ to do. This is very, very important.”

“Okay,” Fima murmurs.

“You must remember that there’s life after the war,” Cassian continues. “That it’s possible to be happy, after it. And you must remember that if the choice is between what is correct, and what is right; choose what is right, always. Even if that means going against orders. Do the _right_ thing, Fima. Do the thing you can live with. Make the choice you can understand, and accept. Only do the things you can forgive yourself for.”

“Papa,” Fima whispers, face stricken.

“I didn’t,” Cassian says, voice so soft Jyn can barely hear. His hands are shaking. “I forgot why I fought. I lost myself in the war. I became… I became someone terrible. Someone I couldn’t understand. I couldn’t bear it. More often than not, I… I thought the melancholia, the guilt, the regret, was going to swallow me. I never anticipated surviving the war. Even if the Empire didn’t catch me, I thought… I thought I would kill myself before I ever let myself see peacetime.”

Jyn closes her eyes, wishing these memories were not as fresh to either of them.

“I haven’t told you many of the things I did in the war,” Cassian continues. “Only some things, the things I’ve found the most bearable. I told myself you didn’t need to know everything. And maybe you don’t. I… I don’t know where Leia will assign you, if you’ll be a spy like me, or Special Forces like your mother, or something else entirely. But you need to know what to expect. The kinds of things you will see, no matter what. So I’ve written some of the stories I never told you in here, too. To remind you that no matter what you will have to do, I’ve done things just as terrible, if not more so. That it’s possible to survive all of it.”

Fima looks down at the notebook again, a hint of fear on his face.

“Put yourself first,” Cassian says. “Put your health first. And I mean your mental health, particularly. You must be able to live with yourself. Okay?”

Fima nods, looking back up at Cassian, swallowing hard.

“I wasn’t sure I could, and my uncertainty broke your mother’s heart. I left her, and our marriage fell apart. It was years before I got myself together, years before she could trust me again. She’s forgiven me, for who I was in the war, and I… I’ve accepted what I did, who I was. But we lost so much time. I chose a very difficult route to get here, and my hope is…” Cassian taps the notebook. “My hope is the advice, the thoughts, the suggestions I’ve written in here will help you. Will help you make better choices, prevent you from… From making the same kind of mistakes I did.”

Fima stares at Cassian for a moment, before nodding. He takes the notebook from under Cassian’s hand.

“Thank you,” Fima says.

“One last thing; and this is the most important.”

Fima looks up, and Cassian reaches forward and squeezes his hand.

“There is nothing you can do in this war that your mother and I can’t forgive you for,” Cassian says. “ _Nothing_. You will always be welcomed back here. We will always want to see you, and talk to you. You can tell us as much as you’d like, or as little. We’ll ask questions, or we’ll listen. Whatever you want, whatever you need. We love you, no matter what. No matter what you do, no matter who you become. You’re our son, before everything. Do you understand?”

Cassian is no longer the only one fighting back tears. Fima is, too, and Jyn watches as a couple tears slide down his face.

“I understand,” he says.

“Good,” Cassian breathes. “Good. I love you.”

“I love you too, Papa,” Fima says, and lets Cassian pull him into a hug.

Jyn turns away.

She only makes it a couple steps down the hall before she’s distracted by soft sniffling not coming from the kitchen.

She follows the noise to Ersa’s room, and gently pushes the door open.

Ersa is sitting on the floor next to the bed, her arms wrapped tightly around her knees, tears coursing down her face. She blinks up at Jyn, lip trembling.

“ _Ersa_ ,” Jyn breathes, and in the next breath, she’s on the floor with her, crushing Ersa in her arms.

Ersa makes a soft noise that Jyn interprets to be _Mama_.

“I know, baby,” Jyn says, brushing her hand through Ersa’s dark curls. “I know, I know. It’s okay.”

“I’m t-trying to be strong,” Ersa squeaks, and Jyn smiles into her shoulder. “B-But it’s… It’s really, really hard.”

“I know. Absolutely.”

“Fima… What, what if—”

“No,” Jyn says, voice almost shocking in its ferocity. “No. None of that. He’s coming back to us.”

Ersa pulls back a little, brown eyes darting over Jyn’s face. “How do you know?”

Jyn has always wanted to be honest with her children.

Her parents were never honest with her, and she has spent so much time trying to understand, and forgive their lies. She’s never wanted that for her children.

But she wishes, desperately, that she could come up with a lie that could answer Ersa’s question.

“I don’t,” she tells her. “I don’t know. But I _believe_ that he will.”

Ersa relaxes somewhat, her breathing becoming more regular despite her sobs.

Here is the unspoken truth of Jyn’s statement:

_I have to believe my son will not die_.

And here is the harsher truth, the truth she does not tell Ersa, the truth that she hopes Ersa will understand why she did not share it, that Ersa will forgive her for:

_I have watched everyone in my family leave me so they can die, and I am terrified it's Fima's turn, and yours is coming soon._

She isn’t sure she can forgive either of her children for this. But she knows she must.

And she knows she must believe it will not happen.

She knows.

She clutches Ersa to her chest, and closes her eyes.

 

* * *

 

_Trust the force_ , Lyra whispers.

Lyra dies in a wave of red blaster light.

Jyn runs.

She hides in an underground tunnel; she hides in the dark.

_I have so much to tell you_ , Galen says.

Galen’s eyes stare unblinkingly at a rainy sky.

Jyn stumbles away.

She hides in a compartment under an Imperial shuttle; she hides in the dark.

_Now go. Please. For me. Go_ , Cassian hisses.

Cassian turns away from her, walking straight-backed.

Jyn’s knees hit the floor.

She hides in the dark hallway of an Imperial prison; she hides in the dark.

 

* * *

 

Every time, she hides in the dark.

Every time, she waits for a light.

Every time, she waits for understanding.

Every time, she is asked to forgive.

Every time; she forgives.

 

* * *

 

Jyn is still awake when Cassian climbs into bed next to her. She turns her head, and looks at him, and she sees the tears drying on his face, sees the way his jaw has tensed, how his eyes are tightly closed.

She touches his cheek, and he exhales, shakily.

“I thought I was the only one,” she whispers, thinking of Cassian’s tears in the kitchen, his trembling hands. “You were so calm, and so accepting, and you didn’t fight him on it at all. I thought I was the only one scared out of my _mind_ , I thought…”

“No,” Cassian whispers, and for a second, he looks almost offended. “Of course not.”

He turns his head, opening his eyes and looking at her.

“We can’t stop him,” he says. “He’s going to fight. He’s got every reason to, and they’re the same reasons you and I had for fighting, too. So we can’t stop him. We can’t change his mind. Because we wouldn’t know how to, and because we shouldn’t. And I think… I think, on some level, you know this.”

She nods, because it’s true.

She knows she can’t talk Fima out of it. She knows.

He’s too much like her.

“I had to _try_ ,” she says instead. “I’m so scared, Cassian.”

“I know,” he says. “I am, too. We’re both sad that he’s making this choice. We’re grieving it.”

Denial.

_“You are not going to fight for Leia Organa, Fima.”_

Anger.

_“And I’m your mother. You do as I say. You listen to me.”_

Bargaining.

_“We’ll give you the money, if you refuse to enlist Fima.”_

Depression.

_“He’s my baby.”_

Acceptance.

She opens her mouth, but she can’t find these words.

She thinks Cassian somehow managed to get through all five stages, on his own, in the space of one day.

“How do we do this?” She asks. “How do we… How do we _do_ this?”

She’d thought going to Scarif to steal the Death Star plans was the most impossible mission she and Cassian would undertake.

But this, this; their son going to war. This is more difficult, is harder to break apart, to understand, to have a plan for. 

Harder, somehow, to see a way to survive.

“We trust him,” Cassian says. “And we trust Leia to lead him right. We trust Fima’s instincts, his gut, his beliefs. We trust his cause, and we… We let him go.”

Jyn has never been good at letting go.

It’s the thing she’s probably the worst at.

And this is _Fima_ , this is her son.

“We give Leia everything we can,” Cassian continues. “Because it’ll help keep Fima alive. Because we can’t stop him from going. And it’s something _we_ , you and I, can actually do for him.”

She knows that’s right, too.

She nods, and presses herself to Cassian’s side, and closes her eyes.

 

* * *

 

The next morning, Cassian takes Ersa with him to meet Leia, to talk about the Fest Rebellion.

And Jyn takes Fima out to breakfast.

They take a transport downtown, to a favorite cafe, where the staff all know them by name, who smile and greet them with enthusiasm, who seat them near a large window, looking out over the busy streets of Fulcra.

Fima looks nervous, and Jyn can’t blame him for it.

Their relationship has always been turbulent, and difficult.

“I came in here, a lot, when I was pregnant with you,” she says, and Fima blinks. Whatever he’d been expecting her to say hadn’t been that. “The staff would take care to seat me away from the door, further inside, away from the cold. They could tell I was pregnant, obviously, and new to Fest; that was also obvious. They were kind to me.”

“Was this before Papa came back?”

Fima knows that his parents had been married, and then divorced before he was born, and hadn’t gotten married again until he was two years old. They’ve told him more details in the last few years, since he’d come of age, and they thought he could understand what had happened better.

“Yes,” Jyn says. “I didn’t think he was ever going to come back. I thought it was going to just be you and me. I… I wasn’t perfectly _fine_ with that, but I thought we’d be okay.”

Fima takes her words in, but doesn’t speak.

She sighs.

“I tell you this,” she says, slowly, “To try to help you understand… Why this is so difficult for me. You… I know you’re an adult, Fima. I know I can’t stop you from doing what you want to do. I know going to war is your choice; and I think it might be the _right_ choice, too.”

Fima stares at her, and she wishes he didn’t look so surprised at her support.

“What has Cassian told you about my father, Fima?”

She knows the things she’s told Fima about her father are minimal, are mostly simple facts. His name, his profession, where he was born, what he looked like. And she’s told him that her father died when she was twenty-two, though she hadn’t seen him in years by then. 

She suspects Cassian has told Fima more, because it’s easier for Cassian to talk about Galen Erso than it is for Jyn.

“Papa said that the reason he and you met is because of your father,” Fima says.

Jyn thinks this is probably the kindest thing Cassian has ever said about Galen Erso.

“Well, he’s not wrong,” she says, because it is true that she’d only been brought to the Alliance because of her connection to her father.

She looks at her cup of caf for a moment, and then back up at Fima.

“My father was an Imperial scientist,” she says, and she sees Fima’s eyebrows rise, his shock apparent. “When I was nine, the Empire came to our house, and took him away, to work for them. He didn’t fight them on this. He didn’t fight them on this even after they shot my mother in front of him. He just… went with them. I was twenty-two the next time I saw his face; and it was in a hologram message, where he told me he’d created the Death Star, and that I must destroy it.”

Fima’s mouth has dropped open, and his eyes are as round as the plates scattered throughout the cafe. He knows about the Death Star, knows his parents helped destroy it, but Jyn is pretty sure he didn’t know about his grandfather’s role in building it.

She thinks she should have told him this long ago; but her shame, and her guilt, strangled the words before they could leave her throat.

“I’m telling you this, because I think it’s something you should be aware of,” Jyn says, quietly. “And I’m telling you this, because… Because my parents charged me with fixing their mistakes. Fighting in their war. They made sure I had to be part of it, and they… My father especially… Put the burden of his terrible work on me. Made me feel like it was something I had to fix, for _him_. And I never wanted that for you.”

“What are you talking about?” Fima asks, frowning. “The First Order, it has nothing to do with you--”

“It’s so similar,” Jyn says. “It’s the… The same type of people. And I fought in a war so you wouldn’t have to, but… Look what’s happened. We’re right back here, again.”

“It’s not your fault, Mama.”

“I know, I just…” She shakes her head.

She isn’t Cassian. She can’t speak as fluidly and thoughtfully as him; she never has. She struggles with the words, struggles to make herself clear, struggles to articulate her point. And she thinks this might be the most important talk of her life.

This is her chance, to save her son.

The only way she can.

“It isn’t your fault, either,” she says, and she sees the crease between Fima’s eyes, the same line she gets when she’s confused, and she adds, “I know that doesn’t make any sense to you; you’re eighteen, and the war hasn’t even really started. But one day, sooner or later, you’re going to become so invested in this cause that separating it from yourself is going to be difficult. You’ll think back and remember going to university, and you’ll think you should’ve gone to a New Republic Military Academy instead. You’ll wish you’d been more studious with the piloting lessons Poe gave you. You’ll wish you’d asked your father more about sniper rifles, and working undercover, and how to lie through your teeth. You’ll wish you’d asked me more about building bombs, and fighting in dark alleys, and surviving with nothing but the clothes on your back. You’ll think you could’ve done more. And this is a _lie_ , Fima. It’s false regret. It’s guilt, but you don’t deserve it.”

She sees Fima’s eyes clear, sees that he’s starting to understand.

“Your father told me what he’s told you,” Jyn says. “The things he wrote down in that notebook for you to remember. There really isn’t much for me to add. Save for trying to get you to believe that you are already doing everything you can, that there is nothing more you can do. Whatever you do; it will be _enough_.”

She’d spent most of her years in the war living with her guilt.

Guilt for her father’s role in it, guilt for her mother’s death, and not avenging her fast enough.

Guilt that when Saw and the Partisans left her, she turned around, and walked the other way.

Guilt that Rogue One died, and she didn’t.

Guilt that she didn’t transition into the New Republic Military, when Cassian did.

Guilt that she believed she could go home, that she could be at peace.

She knows, now, that none of that guilt should belong to her.

She gave her body, and her spirit, and her devotion to the Alliance, and the cause.

She gave it _decades_.

She lost everything to it, more than once.

And now here’s Fima, doing so much more.

Because he’s so young, and he’s giving it not just his present, but his future, a future that had been so clear, and bright, and expansive.

He’s narrowing it, for the Resistance.

That is a devastating sacrifice.

That is _everything_.

(Fima; Fima is everything.)

“If you need to come home,” Jyn says. “Come home. Don’t forget that you’ll always have one. Make sure it grounds you. Fest, it… It was always your father’s home, and then it became mine, too. Even without him, when it was just you, and me, Fest was going to be our home. It’ll always be here. _We’ll_ always be here. You understand?”

Fima nods, a small smile on his face.

“I understand, Mama,” he says, and she thinks he does.

“You’ve got your grandmother’s necklace?”

He nods, and fishes the thin cord, the kyber crystal hanging on the end, out from under his sweater.

“Never taken it off,” he says, and she smiles.

“Good,” she says. “Don’t lose it. I don’t… I can’t explain it, but it helps. It’ll make you feel less alone.”

Fima grins.

“I know,” he says. “It always makes me think of you.”

She doesn’t tell him to trust the force, like Lyra did.

She remembers being nine years old, and hearing those words from her mother, and being uncertain as to what to do with them. They weren’t comforting. They weren’t understandable. At the time, they weren’t meaningful.

There was only one thing she’d really wanted to hear from her mother, before she lost her forever.

Before she left home.

To her son now, she says what she’d wanted to hear then: “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Fima says, so emphatically, so quickly, because it’s the truth, and Fima Andor and Jyn Erso are people who can only speak both fluidly and emotionally when they’re telling their most honest truth.

“I’m proud of you,” she says, because she thinks Fima needs to hear this, too. “For going so far to university, all on your own. You’re smart, but you’re kind, too. You’re kind to Ersa, and the neighbors, and everyone else you meet.” 

She doesn’t know where Fima’s kindness came from. Where he learned how to be kind. _Kind_ is not a word frequently associated with Cassian Andor. But _kind_ is a word for Fest, for the people, living together among so much gray.

_(Kind_ is not a word Jyn Erso thinks when she thinks about herself.)

“But you aren’t afraid to speak your mind, aren’t afraid to stand your ground,” Jyn continues. “You aren’t afraid to stand up for what you believe in. You’re… You’re not afraid.”

She is so, so scared.

( _Fearless_ is a word Jyn Erso can barely recognize anymore.)

“I’m a little afraid,” Fima says, quietly, like it’s a confession.

“That’s all right,” she replies, and she’s a little relieved, relieved that Fima can admit his fear, and relieved because she hopes this means he’ll be at least a little cautious. “That’s to be expected. What I really mean is… Don’t do anything stupid, or ridiculous, to prove yourself. Especially not to your family. You’re already everything we wished you would be. You’re so _good_.”

“I had some stellar role models,” Fima says, and she laughs, but it sounds like a sob, and Fima adds, “Don’t cry, Mama.”

“I’m not. Don’t look at me.”

Fima laughs loudly at that, and it’s a laugh she knows. It’s hers.

He reaches across the table, and takes her hands in his.

“Thank you,” he murmurs.

 

* * *

 

On Yavin 4, Jyn sat outside the Great Temple, and thought of the end, and thought of her failure, and her father and her guilt.

Mon Mothma approached her, brown eyes bright with unshed sympathy.

Wisely, she didn’t move closer, didn’t touch Jyn.

“I won’t forget what we did to you,” Mon Mothma said, and walked away.

Jyn sat in the dirt, and looked at the blue sky.

The cause had finally taken absolutely everything from her, she thought.

Absolutely everything.

 

* * *

 

Leia Organa stands on the sidewalk in front of the house, her long black coat bundled tightly around her, the hood pulled up.

Ersa wraps her arms around Fima’s waist, pressing her face into his chest.

“Come back,” she says, and her voice is a sob.

Fima nods, and kisses her forehead. “I will. And I’m going to call you so much, you’re going to get sick of seeing my dumb face.”

“Never,” Ersa says, hiccuping a laugh.

Fima turns to Cassian next, hugging him tightly, pressing his chin into his father’s shoulder. Cassian kisses his forehead.

“Be good,” Cassian says. “Be brave. Be smart. Be _forgiving_.” 

And then, as an afterthought: “And let us know where you’re stationed.”

Fima nods, but glances back at Leia, who rolls her eyes, having overheard Cassian’s words.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Fima,” she calls. “You can always tell _Cassian Andor_ and _Jyn Erso_ where the Resistance is.”

“Right,” Fima mutters, turning back to Cassian, who smiles.

“You checked in with your superior officer, first,” Cassian says. “That’s right. Good.”

He touches Fima’s face, and then he lets him go, tucking Ersa under his arm.

Fima looks at Jyn.

She nods once, and then yanks Fima down into a hug.

“Call us anytime,” she says. “Don’t try to guess the time on Fest, it doesn’t matter. You call us when you need us. And at least once a week. Don’t think I won’t call Leia personally, and embarrass you in front of all your friends.”

“Got it,” Fima says.

“And I don’t know where Leia is going to assign you…”

He won’t be a pilot; Poe Dameron may have taught him how to fly, but Fima never took to it, like Jyn and Cassian never did, and she expects Leia will have a near-plethora of pilots, going by the exoduses at academies around the galaxy.

Fima will be a soldier.

Maybe a spy, like Cassian.

Or a Special Forces operative, like her.

Or something else entirely.

She doesn’t know what frightens her the most.

She sighs.

She knows just one thing for sure:

“Wherever you end up, whatever you do,” she says, “You’ll have a proud, supportive mother. Don’t forget that.”

“I won’t,” Fima says, and she believes him. “Love you, Mama.”

“Love you, Fima.”

She loved him first.

She loved him before Cassian did. Before Leia did, before Poe and Kes, before Travia, Amaia, and Asori. Before Ersa could. 

Before the war could claim him.

Before he could love himself.

She loved him first.

And she’s the last to let him go.

She steps back, and she watches Fima hoist his bag over his shoulder, and turn, walking away from her, to Leia on the sidewalk. She hears Cassian murmur something to Ersa, and then her daughter is wriggling under her arm, throwing her arm around Jyn’s waist, leaning on her.

She clutches Ersa to her chest, and feels Cassian grip her shoulder.

Leia waits for Fima to reach her, and then she looks over, surveying the family watching from the yard.

She meets Jyn’s eyes, and she nods.

(There’s an understanding.)

Fima glances back, and smiles at Cassian, and winks at Ersa, and looks at Jyn.

He lifts his hand, and waves farewell.

Jyn mirrors the movement.

(There’s a forgiveness.)

She swallows, and she watches Leia and Fima walk away, down the street, disappearing into the gray light of Fest.

Cassian presses a kiss to Jyn’s head, and squeezes Ersa’s shoulder.

“Come on,” he says. “Let’s go inside. Ersa, can you put the kettle on?”

Ersa nods, and skips away, darting through the deep gray snow, running inside the house.

Cassian wraps an arm around Jyn’s shoulders, and she leans against him, letting him pull her inside. The door closes behind them.

“He’ll be okay,” Cassian says.

She nods, and looks at the fire, looks at the holograms resting above it. She studies her son’s round face, his big eyes, his thick hair, as he laughs, and laughs.

_He looks just like me,_ she thinks.

And she’s still here. Despite it all. Despite everything.

She’s survived it all.

It’s the kind of thing Jyn Erso is good at: surviving, despite the odds.

She thinks, maybe, it can be the kind of thing Fima Andor is good at, too.

He’s her son, after all.

She looks out the window.

The snow is gray again.

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: Ersa turns 18 six years after this story, in 34 ABY. that is the same year THE FORCE AWAKENS takes place. just a fun fact.
> 
> The "understanding/forgiveness" motif is borrowed from GRAY AREAS, where Serafima realized Cassian was going to fight no matter what she said or did. So she gave him her understanding and her forgiveness; later, Cassian realizes this was a gift. But Fima is older than Cassian was then, and so he knows it is a gift from Jyn now. 
> 
> "Be brave/be good/be smart" and "be forgiving" were also borrowed from GRAY AREAS. Cassian remembers the first three from Nerezza, Gabriel, and Wada. He does not remember that Zeferino told him to be forgiving (understandable, considering the circumstances of it) though repeating it now suggests he does on an unconscious level.
> 
> Leia's fall, and the start of this second war, was based on info cavalierly taken from BLOODLINES though I've never read BLOODLINES so don't take it too seriously here. the movements of Ackbar and Academy students also somewhat embellished.
> 
> The University of Coruscant, Sperinad University, and University of Garos are all Old EU canon. The University of Coruscant is mentioned in YOU MUST REMEMBER THIS; Ethan's husband is a history professor there. he probably knows Fima. There is no mention in any EU canon of a university on Fest.
> 
> Cassian tells Leia that she can always call on him and Jyn for help, should she need it, at the end of AMOR FATI. this is her cashing in on that; literally. 
> 
> Everything Jyn mentioned that happened while she was pregnant with Fima, including the dreams, moving to Fest, Cassian not being there, occurred in AMOR FATI. the mentioned details in Cassian's notebook for Fima all occurred at some point in the Nonsense.
> 
> The suggestion that Cassian came from a family of wealthy potters continues to be the weirdest thing I've ever come up with, re: Cassian. (The Angels are a close second, but c'mon.)
> 
> The brief mention of Cassian walking to his death while Jyn watched came from YOU MUST REMEMBER THIS. Mon Mothma's words to Jyn outside the Temple on Yavin 4 came from the ROGUE ONE novelization.
> 
> This was the Jyn and Fima story I mentioned before, and I know this story was sad, and not what you were expecting, if you asked for it (some of you did.) I just had an image in my head of Leia walking to the house and Jyn thinking about change, and this happened. 
> 
> I know the ending is ambiguous, but it's tough to write about this time period (pre-FORCE AWAKENS) in STAR WARS because the canon writers are still working on it. it was easier to write the Nonsense, which takes place in the past.
> 
> the good news about the ambiguity is you get to decide what happens next.
> 
> feel free to hit me up here, or on tumblr: theputterer there too.


End file.
